


the between-places

by FictionIsSocialInquiry



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: (Im sorry readers of RHI I will get to it eventually I promise), AU, Angst, Drabbles, Dreams, F/M, Fluff, Lucid dreams, What Could Have Been, because I don't know if I'm capable of writing long-form anymore, introspective, season 1 AU, zkdd, zutara-centric
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-08
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:21:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 5,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27963701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FictionIsSocialInquiry/pseuds/FictionIsSocialInquiry
Summary: there are tiny moments, shards of life, that brought us here. in our dreams we see them all, we see what isn't.we see what we're left with.we see now.a shame, then, that we will forget this too.
Relationships: Katara/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 92
Kudos: 86





	1. first

**Author's Note:**

  * For [goldilocks23](https://archiveofourown.org/users/goldilocks23/gifts).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This wasn’t supposed to happen.
> 
> But here we are.
> 
> I’m starting late with Day 8 and will be sobbing my way through assorted prompts for ZKDD (sobbing because I absolutely don’t have time for this and am neglecting my RL responsibilities but YOLO I’m going down with this bad life choice). This is one connected story, told in drabbles (does she write anything other than drabble stories anymore?? Probs not).
> 
> I’m going to trial something for this story only: No capitalisation of any words. This story should feel like a lucid dream and I feel that if I can try to replicate that in the formatting… Here’s hoping it adds to your reading experience!
> 
> Finally, I both blame and thank goldilocks23 for this even existing. I am so mad/grateful to her for inspiring me with her own ZKDD drabbles (which are spectacular btw, definitely go check them out). Ily, mate (also how dare you).
> 
> Please enjoy and hurl me a kudos, bookmark, and comment to validate this terrible decision.

_tiny shivers_

they meet in the between-places. they meet in dreams.

they meet and they see a time where war did not ravage their world, where they grew up unscarred with living mothers, where they grew up friends, where the avatar was their teacher instead of the other way around. there are tiny shivers— ripples in history as subtle as butterfly wings— that changed the course of the world.

the moon is waning gibbous this night, the first night.

her priestesses would say this is a time of love and gratitude and giving.

his sages would say this is a dark time for men, where chaos is rife and fire simmers.

they meet in the between-places, they meet in dreams.

here, they don’t fight over an avatar.

here they watch what could have been and together tremble at the vast threads of time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> About that terrible decision-validating kudos/bookmark/comment?? Yeah that would be wonderful <3


	2. second

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> water is no companion for fire.

_lock and key_

the dream place is neither here nor there, it is everywhere and nowhere. there is nothing it cannot show them.

 _is this real?_ and _what are you doing in my dreams?_ she asks him but the between-place is busily materialising a stone courtyard threaded with moss and lichen, a balmy summer’s day, a head full of hair knotted atop his head and a tunic of fine blue silk around her torso.

here, he is unscarred, whole.

here, she has memories of a life lived with other southern waterbenders.

 _are you ready?_ she hears herself call with all the confidence of the ocean. she has answers for him, he knows it too. here and now, whenever this is, he is learning from grandmaster katara of the south. she has truths that no fire nation teacher could give him, keys for locks he can open nowhere else.

he does not answer in words, only bends at the knee and kicks flames at her.

—

they are not fighting.

not quite.

she is teaching, he is learning.

the lesson concerns power and where it resides.

 _you have to learn to adapt, to turn my attacks against me,_ she tells him when her water drowns his fire again. she comes closer, adopts his starting form and flows through it softer yet stronger. _power is about both yin and yang, push and pull. like uncle iroh showed us when we were kids_.

 _you were always better at it,_ he mutters but not in a way that begrudges her this win. the admiration makes gemstones of his eyes.

she grins, wolf-sharp and wicked. _like i was going to let some firelord’s nephew beat me_.

it’s a familiar joke between them, she can see it in the way he rolls his eyes, the glimmer in her own. _again?_ he asks her.

she nods. _again_.

—

the stone courtyard dissolves in an instant and he is scarred once again, bald but for the thin slither of dark hair tied with the golden band his mother gave him a lifetime ago.

_your mother?_

he can’t quite see her but there’s an arctic smudge in his peripheries the size and shape of his new, grudging respect for water.

the words spill out; he cannot keep truth from anyone in this place of dreams. _you’re a prodigy. the only grandmaster of your generation from the south_. there was more but its fading now, fading as dreams do with the shattering return of reality.

 _no_ , she tells him. _i am the_ only _bender from the south. there is no one left for me to test my strength against_.

the dream fades to darkness but they cannot help overhearing one another think it, only an octave apart in their harmony: down another of time’s threads, she had tested her strength against him and found her equal.

he cannot handle the discord of these notes.

water is no companion for fire.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Turns out listening to moody orchestral music that sounds like a sorrowful rainy day makes this sort of fic happen? Who knew. Not I. There is a wee comment box down there. It humbly requests that you tap some words into it and hit "comment."


	3. third

_featherlight_

she is only spectator to this dream.

back in her sleeping furs, her body is exhausted; she and her friends have only just escaped him and his scheming and a temple brought to ruins by aang’s predecessor’s efforts to keep the current avatar safe.

it’s the winter solstice, 99 ag.

none of them are safe.

she is only a spectator to this dream.

to his dream.

in the between-place, she names his crimes. she names him.

 _zuko_.

—

it’s a memory, this dream of rain and cruelty.

 _this really happened to you_ , she realises when the otherworldly dream waters wash away her waking rage at him and his vendetta against the only hope this world has left. _what does it mean? what they’re calling you?_

but the sky is tearful and grey and he is knocked down again. this time he doesn’t get back up. the older boys stand above him, the older boys he desperately wants to be more like— they’re the ones his father praised on his last tour of the royal academy.

he is face down in a puddle.

_featherlight prince zuko, disgrace to his father’s name._

he doesn’t want her witness to this.

 _feathersoft princeling, too weak to even stand in the rain_.

he closes his eyes.

just one more indignity to his name, he tells himself. he’s weathered far worse.

—

 _featherlight is such a typically fire nation upper class thing to call someone_ , the southern peasant rages as the older boys sneer. he hates her in a hot and desperate flash of passion, hates her for seeing this, hates her sympathy and her people and her element pressed up against his face.

 _dishonourable, a stain on our house_ , the older boys jeer as though through a fog; their voices are warping, deepening now.

 _what’s happening?_ her manner shifts in a moment; an ocean storm suddenly frozen over. _who is that?_

zuko closes his eyes tighter; the marred one aches dully.

this he really doesn’t want his enemy to see. but he can’t stop it. not here. this is the between-place. there are no lies here except for the ones they tell themselves.

the boys are gone now, the silhouette of a man in their place.

the figure crouches beside him.

without a word, his father sets him alight.

—

she’s forgotten almost everything when she wakes, left with little more than a sickening, cold fury— a pit in her gut that beats in time with her pulse. the firelord… she dreamed of him and of fire. but she’s forgotten more than she remembers.

he doesn’t think anything is amiss when he wakes, accustomed now to waking from this particular nightmare. zuko has a pit in his stomach, too, though it’s not cold but warm. its alien to him, this warmth, and fragile as glass.

in the privacy of his bedroom aboard the naval vessel, in the early glow of morning, he examines this seeded candle flame that flickers beside his angry inner fire.

 _you're not alone_ , it whispers.

zuko scoffs and flings the warm thing to the steel floor. he does not look back at it as he prepares for the day. he dares not. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Zuko’s backstory isn’t tragic enough in canon,” thought FISI to herself as she wrote this. “I know. I will make it Much More So.”
> 
> You may now boo me.
> 
> OR! Come say hi on tumblr! I mostly don’t bite and my inbox is depressingly empty. Asks and such always welcome! (https://fictionissocialinquiry.tumblr.com/)


	4. fourth

_falling with you_

_i am not angry, prince zuko, master katara, only disappointed_.

they roll their eyes at that— behind the wizened avatar’s back, of course. ethics class, or being held back after it by their teacher, is no place to disrespect the old man.

here, now, they are vibrating with twin nerves— his stricken, wrestling him into acceptance, hers stubborn, loudly indignant.

they are fifteen and sixteen and the blood of chiefs and kings lives in their veins.

sifi avatar or not— they have a code and that means they have each other’s backs.

—

 _this is a bad idea… katara…_ katara _, are you listening to me?_

_shh, its only a bad idea if we get caught._

_there’s a_ reason _you’re not meant to go into the dragon sanctuary without a fire sage or the avatar! the dragons will be offended!_

 _i know the scripture, zuko, i brought an offering. besides, i just want to meet the masters. there's no waterbending creatures here, they’re locked away in the north. and the northerners just suck. you’ve seen how the kids from there treat me, let alone the adults_ — _they’d never let some girl bender from the south meet the great octo-whales. this is my only chance! now are you in or are you out?_

_agni… sokka warned me you’d get me into trouble._

_what? when?_

_his last visit._

_you mean the one where i caught you both flexing over who could grow more facial hair?_

_shut up, i told you we were talking about something else! you heard wrong!_

_whatever, will you open this stupid firebending door or not?_

_…_

_zuko. you promised._

_urg. fine._

_yes! you’re the best, you know that?_

_hm. stand back. and keep watch…_

—

avatar aang fixes them with a steady look. _the masters ran and shaw entrusted your uncle with their daughters, prince zuko. firelord iroh is their protector. what is the world meant to think if his own nephew_ —

the girl is of water, do not be fooled by her eyes’ blaze. _zuko had nothing to do with it, sifu aang_ —

_katara!_

— _it was my idea. i forced him into it._

 _she did not!_ the boy steps forward, fists clenched, body firmly positioned between the calm old man in orange robes and the water tribe girl. i _chose to disturb the masters, sifu aang._

she is having none of that. she yanks him back with a handful of crimson silk, glowering. _what are you_ doing? she hisses _. if your father finds out_ —

 _prince ozai need not be informed_ , the wizened avatar says peaceably. he is grinning sunny beach-side breezes. _the firelord and i wish to speak with you both but his highness prince ozai need not know_.

the girl and the boy share a silent conversation— all in a look. it tickles the avatar to his core to see it. so much exchanged with no words at all.

his grin broadens. he is one hundred-and-twelve, wise enough not to interrupt what blossoms before him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My interpretation of “falling with you” is a little loose but hopefully clear. They’re taking the fall for each other in AU world where they grew up friends. Also, look! Aang! And he’s a 112 year old man! Surely that’s worth a wee comment *shakes begging tin at you*


	5. fifth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> what passes for the scarred boy and the water girl in this place consider one another. carefully.

_living proof_

they linger a moment as the wizened monk’s classroom fades around them. zuko is little more than a flicker of flames in her peripheries, she a vague moonlit shape in his.

_the avatar…_

_aang_ , she breathes, striving to commit every second of the old man with the quiet grey eyes to memory. _he was…_

_old._

what passes for the scarred boy and the water girl in this place consider one another. carefully.

he breaks the silence first. _why would i defend you?_

that hurts. it shouldn’t, but it does. had he not felt what she had? that she would have died before she let him suffer for her?

had he not felt the same?

did he feel nothing at all?

 _i wish you would disappear_ , she snaps with her hurt and her wounded heart. _i wish your ship would sink and you with it! i wish you were dead!_

—

she expects rage.

she waits for it, for the storm that will stand toe to toe with her own.

instead she receives bewilderment

 _no, you don’t_.

they cannot lie here. they cannot lie.

she can’t see him exactly, but she knows he’s staring off somewhere far from here, this nowhere place of dreams.

_i know why i defended you._

she does, too. she’d been there, right there beside him. the fierceness of their friendship was difficult to forget, even as everything else about the dream fades.

he’s the coldest flame she’s ever felt. _it will never happen outside of these dreams_.

 _good_ , she shouts and _pushes_ at him with that sense that usually bends water. here it’s not liquid that moves but the firebender. she reaches inside him and bends his chi. he cries out, stumbles. _the next time i see you i’ll make sure i leave you with_ proof _of just what we are to one another!_

—

the next day he “saves” her from pirates and taunts her with her dead mother’s necklace.

she’s honest even in waking life. she gives him her proof. katara leaves him with a scar over his left temple.

crescent shaped and white as the moon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Does a scar count as “living” proof? Probably not. Let us squint until it does though. Squint hard enough that your cursor moves to the comments box and your fingers type out your thoughts on this chapter!


	6. sixth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> there’s truth to what she says, but there are also lies. this is the between-place, the only lies are the ones they tell themselves.

[ ](https://ibb.co/RzjGc6W)

_spine_

she can still feel the rope around her wrists that night, the tree bark at her back, even here in the between-place. she is hurricane, spiting fury.

_try to understand_ , the prince begs her. _i’ve been stripped of my honour, banished. i have to do this. i have to capture him! i have to get my life back!_

_you don’t! that’s the thing! you don’t! all this bravery and strength and you waste it all trying to make the firelord notice you! coward! you know what the right thing to do is! so do it!_

there’s truth to what she says, but there are also lies. this is the between-place, the only lies are the ones they tell themselves.

_you have no idea what you’re talking about! you have no clue what my life has been like!_ he is pleading that she see where he is coming from, that she accepts the story he’s been telling himself.

_you think i care? you think anyone cares about some spoiled, pampered prince?_ she is demanding that he step up. grow a spine. make a difference. serve others.

the between-place invites them to see with unmuddied eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter and tomorrow’s are sort of parts 1 & 2 of the same chapter. As in, they are to be read together. “Spine” just sets up “one at a time.” I’m curious: What do you guys think the between-place invites them to see? What are they misunderstanding about each other? 👀


	7. seventh

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the fire prince tries to speak but her panic has a terrible, cliff-edge despair to it; a long, long way to fall from so sharp a precipice. 
> 
> he decides, instead, to listen.

_one at a time_

cicada-hoppers sing. sunshine falls soft and sleepy. the earth kingdom is lush and wet with the onset of spring rains. sokka and aang are goofing off in the shallows of a lazy, winding river. katara is standing by the shore, calling.

 _the comet is coming_ , she shouts to them. _the world is looking to you to save it, aang_.

take this seriously.

don’t fail us.

don’t fail me.

the fire prince tries to speak but her panic has a terrible, cliff-edge despair to it; a long, long way to fall from so sharp a precipice.

he decides, instead, to listen.

 _aang doesn’t listen_ , she confides. _he’s just a kid from a time when the world was at peace_.

 _he’s never known war_ , the firebender agrees.

it’s barely a concession. this he can give her. just this.

—

he used to dream vividly of his home, used to draw on his memories of garden ponds and crimson curtains fluttering in sticky summer breezes until they were as worn as the pages of a favourite book. now he only sees the paintings, the ones his uncle purchases at markets around the world.

_you don’t remember what your home looks like?_

in the waking-world, his shoulders would stiffen, and he would lash out with fire and hurtful words like _peasant_ and _filth_. but here, he just stares at the half-finished watercolour before him.

silently, he raises the brush, but he never knows what to do about the doorways. were they dark brown? black? was there gold trimming? red leather in-laid?

 _i forget a little more every day_. his chest caves with sheer panic. _i’m forgetting my father and sister too. i’ve already forgotten what my mother looked like. when i think of her now i just see her portrait._

the girl of water does not know what to say to that.

—

_where are we?_

she looks for him but of course he is not there. no one was on that drizzling, overcast headland, that had been the whole point.

 _cover your ears_ , she tells him then she turns to the sky, a sob in her chest, and she screams as loud as she can. the ocean’s roar catches her bellow, cushions it, and drags it out to sea. there is no one around to hear but the wind.

_what’s wrong with you? are you in pain?_

there are tears mixing with the sea spray on her cheeks.

she isn’t allowed to fall apart around the others— someone must keep their little family together and she is that someone.

_but that’s not fair…_

she opens her mouth to answer but only more screams come out.

—

the scene is murky. muddled.

it is too dark for day, too dimly lit for night.

 _my ship_ , he reveals, and she can see him now, kneeling before a minimally decorated steel wall. there is a low table before him, alight with candles and incense.

above them, swords and a mask hang upon the wall.

_what are you doing?_

_i’m deciding_.

_deciding what?_

he stands, clumsy with uncertainty. she’s never seen the prince of fire like this. almost absentmindedly he takes the grinning demon mask from the wall; it’s as blue as her element.

 _what being a traitor means. whether my destiny is to betray_.

somehow, they both know the answer.

 _you have to choose. it’s not a betrayal, it’s a choice_.

his smile is jagged with bitterness. _you wouldn’t survive a day in my homeland with thinking like that._

she neglects to remind him that, in another place, in another time, she had _thrived_ in his homeland.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Empathy is a powerful way for people to connect to one another, one memory at a time 😉. We’re somewhere between “The Waterbending Scroll” and “The Great Divide” canon-wise… next chapter we go into “The Storm.”
> 
> Now we’re a few chapters into this thing: How are you feeling about “the between-places” so far? What do you like about it? Is there anything that pulled you out of the flow of the story— anything that could be improved on? I’d love to know your thoughts!


	8. eight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the rain is relentless, the sea writhing with fury. again, he is forced to appreciate the power in water.
> 
> it frightens him into respect.
> 
> it takes his breath away.

_breathless_

there is a storm.

he witnesses his uncle’s true power; the old man leaps in front of lightning and bends it away from the bridge. it is like nothing he’s ever seen before from a firebender. his uncle’s power shocks him.

but he has little time to appreciate it.

zuko navigates the sheeting rain and slippery rungs of his ship and rescues his helmsman. the storm is a beast of nightmares. it hungers for victims— the rain is relentless, the sea writhing with fury. again, he is forced to appreciate the power in water.

it frightens him into respect.

it takes his breath away.

perhaps that is why it happens; she is already on the peripheries of his mind.

the water tribe girl is crouched on the starboard side of his ship, back to the steel railing, eyes squeezed closed, hair whipping around her; a cacophony of dark tendrils. she looks up, her eyes widen in recognition, and she is gone.

—

there is a storm.

she loses consciousness when the ocean swallows appa, fears the power of her element now she is at its mercy. her grandmother always said, _the sea seethes and the sea takes_. and now it may well take her life. fighting to stay awake, her thoughts are only of her brother— she sends a silent prayer to the spirit of the ocean. _please_ _spare sokka_.

perhaps la hears her. perhaps aang does. he glows and she can breathe again, can drag herself more firmly into the saddle despite her wet hair whipping in an avatar’s wind.

it’s as she squints through the howling winds and ocean spray that she spies him.

the fire prince freezes, solid as ice, blinking at her.

but then appa breeches the surface and the scarred boy disappears into the white water.

—

_i saw you today._

_and set sail, no doubt. full steam ahead, hunting us. again._

_no, not then. not the bison…_

she refuses to acknowledge him. she is blank as the sky, cold as oceans.

_i saw you on my ship._

if the girl of water hears him, she does not reply.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are so far still canon-compliant, believe it or not. “The Storm” is a fantastic episode for so many reasons. I think it might have been the first episode of AtLA I ever saw? One of the first anyhow. The Zuko/Aang parallels are fab!
> 
> You know what else is fab? Kudos, bookmarks, and comments :D OR heading over to tumblr to say g’day! (https://fictionissocialinquiry.tumblr.com/)


	9. ninth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the between-place is otherworldly. impossible things happen here, like a firebender’s certainty thrown into doubt with the magnitude of a waterbender’s loss.

_can you feel me?_

katara closes her eyes. if she could cry here in the between-place, she would. her mother’s mitten is scratchy against her cheek, the wool home spun and home knit— she should know, she spun the yarn herself.

 _it’s okay, sweetheart_ , kya tells her without even a tremble in her voice. katara is six and her child’s heart cannot come close to fathoming what she is about to lose. her mother, her steady, strong, smiling mother— her anchor to peace when the world made her want to scream at its cruelty. _sweetheart, go find your dad_.

 _don't!_ the boy of fire burns bright with the echo of her resigned terror. she knows how this story ends even if he does not.

kya is about to die.

 _fight him!_ the fire prince shouts at her, rails at her, _pushes_ at her until she groans, staggers to her feet, and faces the shadowy man at her mother’s back. _fight back, katara!_

she doesn’t.

this is nothing but a memory.

they can’t cry here but a firebender howls beside her as blood splatters the snow at their feet.

—

the between-place is strange.

impossible things happen here, a thousand in any given moment. memories cross into dream, snow burns knees when heartbroken girls fall onto it, the south pole fades into a swirling constellation where katara floats, hugging herself to keep her edges from bleeding into the cosmos.

the between-place is otherworldly. impossible things happen here, like a firebender’s certainty thrown into doubt with the magnitude of a waterbender’s loss.

_she’s…_

the girl is fifteen but ancient with sorrow. _gone. for years now._

the firelord’s son is still choking on water tribe grief. this hits far too close to home. _he’s a monster. what he did… a_ monster _, katara_.

he’s kneeling beside her now, embodied enough that she can take his hand and he can pull her nearer, crushing her in a woe-sick hug. it is unclear who is holding whom up. perhaps they hold up one another.

—

 _i promise you justice_ , he whispers as though frightened by the very thought. she feels him steel himself to it, set it in stone, hinge his honour on the words. _one day, i’ll be firelord and i’ll make sure that man is found and tried and brought to justice._

they’re still trembling, wisps holding together in a fading world of dreams. she grips him tighter. _only if i hand over aang, though right?_

 _no_. there is fire in this firebender’s voice; certain, driven flames. _no, this is not about the avatar. i vow to give you justice for your mother, enemies or not._

the word _honour_ hovers on the tip of his tongue.

he puts great importance on such things.

the between-place is fading, wearing thin around the seams.

the girl merely shakes her head and holds him tighter— somethings are bigger than war and whose side they are on. she has no use for words and notions and the lies this boy tells himself about his place in it. she is of water.

_can we just…_

she should be embarrassed— would be, were this waking life. but water wants what it wants. the between-place strips away the artifice of _water tribe_ and _fire nation_ , of _enemies_ , of _boy_ and _girl_.

she swivels, lays a ghostly hand over his forearm.

he understands only because thoughts are as loud as words here. he lays back with her curled into his side.

they cling together here until the sun drags them back to the waking world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look. I have clearly become carried away with the whole dream-world imagery thing. I am having far too much fun coming up with new ways to torture them into being soft with each other. Fight me. I ain’t stopping.
> 
> With that said— please leave a wee comment as I’m (to be sung in John Ralfio’s voice) a sucker for validaaaaaaaation!


	10. tenth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> there is caution now in the between-place.
> 
> they are wary.
> 
> there is a comet coming and a war to be fought and despite what happens here they are not on the same side.

_feeling sentimental_

there is caution now in the between-place.

they are wary.

there is a comet coming and a war to be fought and despite what happens here they are _not_ on the same side.

which is hard to remember when they tumble into dreams of what could have been. _here,_ they are everything to one another. here, he travels to the south pole with her during the summer solstice aboard a proud southern galley woven from ice. he wears furs, not silks. he shares a family home, not a palace. he sleeps communally, not alone.

his cot is beside sokka’s— they have only just stopped whispering about the catapult they want to build tomorrow— but he catches her eye across the firepit.

she grins at him, wrinkles her nose at her brother’s open-mouth snores.

heat that has nothing to do with bending or the flames beside him warms his belly.

—

 _are you and sokka playing war games_ again _today? urg._

_they’re not war games. we’re inventing new weapons._

_cool._

_you’re just jealous, katara._

_that’s grandmaster katara to you._

_not until the ceremony tomorrow, it isn’t._

_enjoy your last twenty-four hours of perceived superiority,_ prince _zuko._

_that’s your royal highness, protector of the southern isles, son of the east, fourth in line for the throne of flames prince zuko to you._

_and yet, you’re my brother’s lacky._

_he’s_ my _lacky_

_sure, he is… well, enjoy wrestling sokka for who gets to use the wood saw._

_where are you going?_

_to the hot springs in the spirit gardens. there’s a village gathering in an hour so they’ll be empty._

_hot springs?_

_uh huh._

_… i’ll talk to sokka. wait for me._

—

the world around them flickers. it buckles. distortions tear holes in this other world, this other life of this other zuko and katara. it’s like the aurora, these meandering snatches of light and shadows that warp the stage and setting of the southern spirit gardens.

they become dizzy, even less sure of reality and dreams. they oscillate between dwelling within the bodies of these other-life selves, and hovering above them, silent ghosts to the spectacle.

the spectacle is the slow and clumsy dance towards love.

she blushes as he sheds his parka, he looks everywhere but at her when she drops outer clothing like raindrops.

they cannot deny what they feel: they are these other-selves.

they cannot deny what they see: they are disembodied spectators to something soft, something fledgling. something undeniable. here, there are no stakes any higher than beating hearts. no war. no father tyrant. no avatar between them.

here there is only her shy smile and his galloping pulse.

—

the instability of the dream finally cracks, bears them back out to the between-place on a rip tide. they wash up somewhere south of understanding, somewhere just outside of disbelief.

there’s only one girl who ever showed an interest in him and she is miles away. miles and miles and he was never more than fleetingly drawn to her silky black hair and cool gaze.

there have never been any boys or girls her age to take an interest in. she is dangerously ill-equipped to deal with the soft uncertainty that she suspects his touch would soothe. this boy… this enemy boy.

they circle planets, orbit whole worlds to keep away.

_wait for me…_

they try to keep apart but there’s a gravity to the between-place that moves them to the rhythm of a vastly more powerful force than their avoidance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m going to ruin the mood I’ve just laboriously created by quoting Enrique Inglese’s corny af 2000s song Run at Zuko and Katara. Ahem. “You can run, you can hide, but you can’t escape my love!”
> 
> Oops. Mood dead.
> 
> Let me know just how dead in the comments…


	11. eleventh

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> how thin is the line between friends?
> 
> how thin, then, is the line between enemies?

_obvious_

there are no expectations on them— they live in a world where their leaders sleep, eat, and breathe peace. the friendship between the firelord’s nephew and the southern chief’s daughter is noteworthy only to friends and family, not nations.

 _tui and la, you firebenders are_ useless _at sea!_

 _not_ everything _is about the ocean, you know?_

 _you come from an island nation, zuko! you should know better than to disrespect the sea_.

no, there are no expectations on them. no one watching this blooming, beating, rising tide between the prince and the daughter-to-the-chief.

_you know how i feel about water._

her cheeks are dusky with the colour of his nation and his are splattered with icy ocean spray, here at the prow of the ship. they are seventeen and eighteen. they are two days into a twelve day voyage.

the only world they need to change is their own.

—

_where are we going?_

he flickers beside her, around her, between places, between dreams. _they’re sailing east_.

we’re _sailing east, you mean._

the star dust that is zuko turns away. _that isn’t us, waterbender._

—

she is intern to the ambassador for ba sing se, the final posting for this year’s politics and diplomacy classes.

he completed his own posting a month ago, graduated with honours. so he searches out a reason to come along. there is gala celebrating a sewerage revitalisation project in the lower ring and it would honour the fire nation engineer for a member of the royal family to acknowledge his efforts.

and if that happens to please his uncle and relieve his cousin of the seasickness of the voyage, if it happens to grant him a cabin on the same ship as her, a room in the earth king’s palace down the hall from her.

well.

let people talk. he’d a master waterbender to tour with around the great city of ba sing se.

—

_i’ve never seen you smile before._

_that isn’t me._

_it is._

_it isn’t! it’s just a dream! when i wake up banished and with a scar this will have changed nothing! this is nothing! just fantasy and wishful thinking!_

_it must be bleak, to live in a world where you don’t allow yourself to dream of something better._

_shut up!_

_it is you, zuko. it’s what you could have been if the world had let you._

—

how thin is the line between friends?

they walk side by side down into the city. no guards. no ambassador. no chaperone. just them. it is twilight but the city is the furthest thing from dark. lanterns cast stolen daylight over the streets— red, yellow, white, blue. ba sing se is alive at night with an energy that sleeps through the day. kind of like the water tribe girl herself.

he watches her from his eye’s corner. he is the pendulum swinging between unbearably terrified and a certainty he can’t quite shake, no matter how sick with nerves he feels.

he’d seen the firelight fountain during his tour of the new lower ring guttering— a feat of fire nation engineering, earth kingdom construction, water tribe plumbing, and air nomad oversight.

 _a fountain?_ she asks, questions hiding behind her eyes.

how thin is the line between friends?

_you know how i feel about water._

_i always thought it was more about your feelings for those who bend water,_ she teases, because she has to; she’s always been the one to translate the unspoken into life.

 _just one_ , he admits and takes her fingers, raises them to brush across his lips in a kiss. he’s always been the one to follow where life leads.

how thin is the line between friends?

—

how thin, then, is the line between enemies?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things be getting Complicated. Book One Zuko takes a lot of prodding (read: bludgeoning) to make him See Sense.


	12. twelve

[ ](https://ibb.co/0JRv9RG)

_crashing waves_

_power in firebending comes from the breath… power in firebending comes from the breath…_

_what are you doing?_

_power in firebending comes from the breath…_

_has anyone ever told you that you’re your own worst enemy?_

_power in firebending…_

_you’re lying to yourself, zuko._

_shut up._

_i just want to talk. will you just… look at me._

_no._

_zuko._

_…_

_please._

—

who knew that the crumbling of worlds could feel like this?

—

_do you think we could have been friends?_

_waterbender…_

_do you?_

_i don’t know, okay? i don’t understand…_

_what don’t you understand?_

_this!_

_what?_

_this place! why you’re here, in_ my _dreams! you! why are you even talking to me?!_

_because_ i _choose to live in a world where we can dream things that are better._

_what the hell do you think this will do? do you think i’ll just give up my home and let your little friend attack my family? you are protecting my enemy! we can_ never _be friends!_

_aang doesn’t have to be your enemy, zuko._

_you’re still defending him! even here!_

_you’re the only one fighting._

—

fear and shame are deadly, dangerous beasts. especially when they are backed into a corner and given a mirror to reflect back at them all their tender places. zuko’s fear and shame crashes around the waters of this between-place, seethes and writhes and threatens to drown them both.

_you’ve seen what this war has done to our world. we’ve both seen what the world could have been like without it._

he is trapped by words— she speaks the truth. the other zuko’s world flourishes under peace, it thrives. but that cannot be right because his father’s war is just, is their divine right…

_what is the point of us coming together here every night, of seeing all this if it changes nothing? if you don’t learn from it?_

—

he never had a chance, not really. not with destiny picking favourites and a waterbender crashing about him like the tides.

—

he wakes with the sun aboard his ship. on his side, his neck is stiff, his arm numb beneath him. the creaking of the ship is no comfort, it never is. its swaying under ocean waves is a constant reminder of his wandering, banished state.

zuko opens his eyes.

before him, on his bedside, sits a blue ribbon threaded through an ivory charm. the sight of it softens the clench in his jaw.

a sigh, a shift; the sheets tugged away from him.

zuko spins, heart in his throat.

the waterbender lays beside him. her eyes are closed, the silk sheet pulled up under her nose. her hair makes a mess of the pillow and he cannot breathe.

he has no time to react.

she blinks heavy eyes open, catches sight of him.

and is gone.


	13. thirteen

[ ](https://ibb.co/LdJFrGZ)

_so sublime_

_you were in my bed this morning._ he hates the words as he says them, would flush from hairline to shirtline were they awake, were this true life.

it isn’t

it is the between-place.

where they cannot lie.

you _were beside_ my _bedroll, you mean._

_i know what i saw, waterbender._

she pauses, the nebulous clusters that are her considering the lack of bite in his tone. _i dream of you. even when you’re not here, i dream about you._

he says nothing.

he dreams of her too.

but he will cut out his own tongue before he admits it.

—

whitewater drowning or the suctioning of a whirlpool, that is what it feels like to be sucked into the dreams of another.

in her dream, she is playing in the water.

_bending_ , she corrects him but there is no bite to it. her lips are stretching in a wandering smile, her body thrumming with focus and flow and the high of embodying the element she bends.

zuko watches the weakest element in movement. even the airbenders had been considerable enough of a threat to warrant an attack but _waterbenders_ …

_you don’t believe that_ , she says smugly without spilling a drop, without even pausing. on she flows, trickling through forms as though there are no bones beneath her skin, no stalagmite rigidity only undulating hills. only pulsing blood and gushing veins.

_and that is why my people are strong_.

he tries to ignore it, but transcendence is hard to turn away from.

_we adapt, we change._

a fire consumes the forest, his father once told him, it takes the air, the wood, the sap.

he once believed this is what power looks like but a forest burns out and so does the fire. but water… water erodes.

it dawns on zuko as her heart races with the tidal bending form: water is empyrean. over time, water is the most powerful force of all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Squint real hard and this works for the prompt. Reeeeeeal hard. There are definitely synonyms for “sublime” in here somewhere.


End file.
